New Pentair VS - how long to run per day?

[khobar]

Hi folks,

I live in Arizona, and the local pool shop guy said for the salt chlorinater to have a hope of working I should be running my pump 10-11 hours a day. That was expensive with the old Whisperflo single speed. So, I bought a Pentair VS and installed it just yesterday. Today it's running, seems to be fine.

I have heard of these being run 24/7, a couple of hours of high-speed for the pool vac and the rest of the time at low speed to circulate the water and have the chlorine generator working all the time. And should I be thinking toward winter - the salt cell shuts down <58 degrees or so.

Thanks!

 

[mknauss]

What SWCG do you have?

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You can lower your rpm of the pump to the point that the SWCG generates and use that for the bulk of your circulation each day. Depending on what SWCG you have and your pool size, it could be a few hours to 24 hours each day.

When the water gets cold enough that the SWCG will not generate, the chlorine needs of the pool water also fall dramatically. I typically add a touch of chlorine every week or two for the couple months my SWCG turns off.

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

I run my pump at 1200 RPM, most of the time because it takes about 1100 for the flow switch to close.. Running faster will not generate anymore chlorine, so slow is the name of the game.

The time you need to run is dependent on how big your pool is and what size cell you have... But, just guessing, I'd say your pool store guy is probably close to being right about the number of hours you will need to run to generate the chlorine you need.

Also involved is the amount of CYA in your pool water. The less CYA, the faster the sun will consume the chlorine.

Thanks for posting,

Jim R.

 

[khobar]

Thanks. I updated my profile with the info I had. We originally had the IC20 but it just didn't really put out enough chlorine and it didn't last long. Nor did it's replacement, so we went with the IC40. Pool is 12 years old (as is the pump we just removed). We have a waterfall, too, if that matters.

So, right now we're still above 100 degrees (86 degrees water temp). As I just set this up it's running on defaults (2 hours 3000rpm, 10 hours 1400rpm, and 2 hours 2200 rpm). I'm thinking keep the 2 hrs 3000rpm and, for now, do 8 hours 1400rpm. I don't see what I'd need the additional 2200rpm? Then when the water temp drops below 58 or 52 or whatever and the SWCG shuts off, I'll keep the 2 hrs 3000rpm for cleaning and skimming, but then what?

Thanks!

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

An IC40 in a 12 K pool will produce about .58 ppm per hour when the cell is set to 100% output. Assuming your pool uses 3 ppm per day (Average is 2 to 4 ppm/day) that means, in theory, you could cut your run time to about 6 hours. If you run longer you will just need to reduce the % of output.

Also keep in mind that we recommend a CYA of 70 to 80 with an FC of about 5... See this chart.. [FC/CYA][/FC/CYA]

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[khobar]

Thanks very much!

As a followup, the new pump has its own controller (obviously), but the old pump ran off the wall-mounted control panel. I presume I should change the wall panel pump timing to 24hours so the new pump will have power available all the time?

 

[mknauss]

How is your SWCG wired in? The SWCG must only have power to it when the pump is running. The flow switch on the SWCG is a secondary safety device. No power is the primary safety device.

So the timer should be used for the SWCG and the pump should have power to it all the time.

 

[khobar]

That's an excellent point.

The SWCG is connected to the Easytouch control panel via a separate 4-pin connector. Looking at the menu tree it seems I can tell it output (%), and there's also "Run Hours" but I think that's for superchlorination.

With the old pump - when the timer was "off" there were no lights on the salt cell. When the pump came on, the SWG lit up like a Christmas tree, but the "flow" LED remained red until the system primed (as necessary). The salt cell continued to cycle LED's until readings (I presume) stabilized.

The new pump uses the old wiring, so it's connected to the Easytouch panel, has it's own breaker, and there's a manual override.

Thoughts?

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

The salt cell's power supply is supposed to be wired through the Pump/Filter relay on your EasyTouch.. Do you really have the Pentair SuperFlo VS or do you have the IntelliFlo VS?? I ask because the SuperFlo cannot easily be controlled by the EasyTouch, which was designed to control the IntelliFlo...

Is the power supply for the IC40 built into your EasyTouch or do you have a separate power supply box?

If you do have the SuperFlo, then you will need to set up a schedule in the ET so that the ET only closes the Pump/Filter relay when your SuperFlo is scheduled to be running.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[khobar]

Hi Jim,

Yes, definitely Superflo VS. It is only connected to the ET panel for power. There are instructions for using low-voltage signaling to control the pump. It's under Connecting to External Controls and requires a wiring kit (353129Z). This looks a lot like the cable used for the SWCG. I do have the PL8 panel, but there's only an unused knockout underneath and not an actual connector.

The IC40 connects to the panel via 4-pin cable, underneath, at the corner of the ET box.

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

If the IC40 connects with a connector below the Main EasyTouch box, then that sounds like you have a built in SWCG power supply.. Do you have 4 circuit breakers in the upper right of the EasyTouch panel? If so the installer should have already wired the SWCG power supply through the Pump/Filter relay.

If you have several unused relays, you can use them to control the SuperFlo.. one speed per relay and of course the cable kit. Certainly better than nothing.

Show me a pic of your ET with the Circuit Breaker cover removed...

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[khobar]

Hi Jim,

Main panel cover removed. Did you mean the upper panel (with the low voltage CB's?) The four "relay" buttons top right (4,5,6,7) do not seem to connect to relays, at least I don't hear anything click when I press them.

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

So you have an older model EasyTouch 4... Which means you have 4 relays... the pump/filter relay in the upper left side and then three more relays. I assume Aux 1 is being used for your pool light and Aux 2 and Aux 3 are not connected to anything. So, if you wanted, you could wire them to the pump so you could turn the pump on and off with your EasyTouch and have it run one of two speeds by using the Aux button or when running a schedule inside the ET..

I am not that familiar with the older ET, so I can't tell if the big transformer is for the SWCG or not. It appears to be wired into the pump/filter relay, but I can't really trace the wires in the pic.. Do you have a separate power supply box for the IC40... it would look like the one if this link...

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Thanks,

Jim R.

- - - Updated - - -

I just noticed a circuit breaker just to the left of where it says "Pentair Water" on the front panel... Is that breaker for the SWCG??

 

[khobar]

LOL - I had not even noticed that before - indeed it is a circuit breaker with a "reset" button for the SWCG. There's also an Intellichlor status LED slightly to the left. Aux1 is the lights, and Aux2 and Aux3 are unused.

 

[khobar]

I was curious about my panel, and I'm even more curious now. I found an old thread (Upgrade EasyTouch 4 to 8 - Circuit Board replacement only?) where someone talked about upgrading the motherboard from EZ4 (520659) to EZ8 (520657). I looked on Ebay and found a few 520657's for quite a bit of money, but I noticed they all said EZ8 but had only 4 relays. All the boards, including mine, have 520615 on a label. Mine also says EZTCH 4P.

So, what is the difference between the 4P and 8P motherboards?? Where are the additional relays for Aux 4,5,6, and 7? I have 8 AUX headers, 4 are used (J8-J11) and 4 unused (J12-J15).

Thanks.

 

[Jimrahbe]

K,

I believe the card itself is the same, they just program the ET4 and ET8 with different firmware..

The ET 4 has 4 High Voltage relays down in the circuit breaker area... The ET8 has 8 High Voltage relays... The number of relays on the circuit card have nothing to do with if it is an ET 4 or 8.

So, besides having to buy the circuit card, you would also need to buy the extra High Voltage relays to upgrade the ET4 into an ET8

On the newer EasyTouch units, you can add a 5th relay, called Aux10 (or AuxEx), if you do not use Solar. I am not sure if you can do that on older units or not.

Thanks,

Jim R.

 

[khobar]

Thanks Jim. I saw the four small relays on the back of my board and thought that's what made it a 4. When I saw the same on the 8 I was scratching my head.